Book 62: How to be Both by Ali Smith

This book was short listed for the Man Booker award, and I have been waiting for it to be available for a while.  I was intrigued by the concept and the cover.

If you are not familiar with the book, it is actually 2 books in one that cover the same events, one story (camera) is about a girl in the present and one story (eyes) is told from the view of a man from the 1400's.  The stories play off each other and can be read in either order.  I happened to read Camera first.

I enjoyed the book, but was not blown away.  I am not exactly sure why, but I have a couple of guesses, and I don't think it was the authors fault.

1.  I had been waiting for the book and I anticipated something more than it was.
2. I was sick and not really well enough to take in the book.

I think it was a combination of both ( I was sick for 2 1/2 weeks and read a lot of books between sleeping).


I am giving the book some space and I hope to go back to it and read it the other way around, eyes than camera.  Also I knew there was a connection between stories and as I read the first one I was always trying to figure out how they connected.  Don't do that.